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Peter Campbell

Peter Campbell is the London Review’s resident designer and art critic.

From the London Review dated 7 March 2002

Why does it take so long to mend an escalator?

Stepping onto an escalator is an act of faith. From time to time you see people poised at the top, advised by instinct not to launch themselves onto the river of treads. Riding the moving stairs is an adventure for the toddling young and a challenge to the tottering old. Natural hesitancy puts a limit on throughput. London Underground escalators carry passengers at a top speed of 145 feet per minute – close to the maximum allowed under the British Standard specification. There is little temptation to run the machines faster, as trials show that above 160 feet per minute so many people pause timidly that fewer are carried. In the early days they had to be persuaded to get on at all. A one-legged man, ‘Bumper’ Harris, was hired to ride for a whole day on the first installation – it was at Earls Court – to show how easy it was. Some people were sceptical (how had he lost his leg?) but others broke their journey there just to ride up and down. [ read more . . . ]

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In the LRB archive

subscriber-only content At the National Portrait Gallery: Wyndham Lewis · 11 September 2008

In the Park: Frank Gehry’s Pavilion · 31 July 2008

subscriber-only content From the National Gallery to the Royal Academy: Peter Campbell on the Divisionists and Vilhelm Hammershoi · 17 July 2008

subscriber-only content At Tate Liverpool: Peter Campbell on Gustav Klimt · 3 July 2008

At the Door: Open Sesame! · 19 June 2008

subscriber-only content In Bexhill: Unpopular Culture · 5 June 2008

subscriber-only content At the British Museum: American Prints · 8 May 2008

At the Hayward: Alexander Rodchenko · 24 April 2008

At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Pompeo Batoni · 10 April 2008

subscriber-only content Function v. Rhetoric · 10 April 2008

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Peter Doig · 6 March 2008

At the Royal Academy: From Russia · 7 February 2008

subscriber-only content At the National Gallery: Good Enough to Eat · 24 January 2008

subscriber-only content At the National Gallery of Scotland: Joan Eardley · 13 December 2007

Global Moods · 29 November 2007

At Tate Modern: Peter Campbell on Louise Bourgeois · 29 November 2007

At Victoria Miro: Sarah Sze’s Art of Arrangement · 4 October 2007

subscriber-only content At the British Museum: Faith, Narrative and Desire · 20 September 2007

At the Royal Collection: Retrieved at the Restoration · 6 September 2007

subscriber-only content At the Wellcome: The Heart · 16 August 2007

At Tate Britain: Prunella Clough · 2 August 2007

subscriber-only content At the Courtauld: Cranach’s Nudes · 19 July 2007

At Tate Britain: How We Are · 5 July 2007

subscriber-only content On the Skyline: Antony Gormley · 21 June 2007

At the National Gallery: Hands and Feet · 7 June 2007

subscriber-only content At the National Gallery: Copying the Masters · 24 May 2007

In Regent Street: A Mile of Style · 10 May 2007

subscriber-only content In the Garden · 26 April 2007

subscriber-only content The Way of the Wobble · 5 April 2007

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At the British Museum: John White’s New World · 5 April 2007

subscriber-only content At the Barbican: Alvar Aalto · 22 March 2007

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Turner's Rigi watercolours · 8 March 2007

subscriber-only content At the White Cube: Peter Campbell on Anselm Kiefer · 22 February 2007

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on the art of protest · 8 February 2007

subscriber-only content At the British Library: Mapping London · 25 January 2007

In Russell Square: Peter Campbell explores Bloomsbury · 30 November 2006

subscriber-only content At the National Gallery: Velázquez · 16 November 2006

At Dulwich Picture Gallery: Peter Campbell on Adam Elsheimer · 2 November 2006

subscriber-only content At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Holbein · 19 October 2006

At the Royal Academy · 5 October 2006

subscriber-only content At Chantilly: Peter Campbell on horses · 21 September 2006

subscriber-only content At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Rembrandt · 17 August 2006

At the National Portrait Gallery: Peter Campbell on the Portraits of Angus McBean · 3 August 2006

subscriber-only content At Tate Modern: Kandinsky · 20 July 2006

At Tate Britain: Howard Hodgkin · 6 July 2006

At Tate Modern: the fairground at Bankside · 22 June 2006

subscriber-only content At the Scuderie del Quirinale: Peter Campbell on Antonello da Messina · 8 June 2006

At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Gentile Bellini · 25 May 2006

subscriber-only content At the Soane Museum: Peter Campbell on Joseph Gandy · 11 May 2006

At the V&A and Tate Modern: Peter Campbell on Modernist Design · 20 April 2006

subscriber-only content At the British Museum: Peter Campbell on Michaelangelo’s Drawings · 6 April 2006

At the Courtauld: Peter Campbell on Giambattista Tiepolo · 23 March 2006

At the Hayward: Peter Campbell on Dan Flavin · 23 February 2006

In Paris · 9 February 2006

At the Wallace Collection: Peter Campbell on Anthony Powell’s artists · 26 January 2006

At Tate Modern: Peter Campbell on Henri Rousseau · 5 January 2006

Short Cuts: Peter Campbell on the Regent Street lights · 15 December 2005

subscriber-only content Get planting · 1 December 2005

  • The Secret Life of Trees: How They Live and Why They Matter by Colin Tudge

At the British Museum: Samuel Palmer’s dream landscapes · 17 November 2005

At the Royal Academy: Edvard Munch’s troubles · 20 October 2005

Open House: Peter Campbell looks through other people’s windows · 6 October 2005

In Auvergne · 1 September 2005

In Cambridge: The Cambridge Illuminations: Ten Centuries of Book Production in the Medieval West · 18 August 2005

At Tate Modern (and elsewhere): How architects think · 21 July 2005

At Tate Britain: Reynolds’s theatrical portraits · 7 July 2005

At the British Museum: Under African Eyes · 23 June 2005

At the V&A: Peter Campbell celebrates Penguin’s 70th birthday · 2 June 2005

At the Royal Academy: Matisse’s revelations · 19 May 2005

At Tate Modern: Like a badly iced cake · 5 May 2005

At Kew · 21 April 2005

At the National Gallery: Caravaggio’s final years · 31 March 2005

At Tate Modern and Modern Art Oxford: Peter Campbell on Joseph Beuys and Jannis Kounellis · 17 March 2005

At the Saatchi Gallery: The Triumph of Painting · 17 February 2005

At the Science Museum: The Rolls-Royce Merlin and other engines · 3 February 2005

In Port Sunlight: Peter Campbell visits the art collection of a soap magnate · 20 January 2005

At the Whitechapel: Peter Campbell on ‘Faces in the Crowd: Picturing Modern Life from Manet to Today’ · 6 January 2005

At Somerset House: Peter Campbell on Zaha Hadid · 16 December 2004

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Paula Rego · 2 December 2004

At the Royal Academy: the art of William Nicholson · 18 November 2004

At Tate Modern: Bruce Nauman’s Raw Materials · 4 November 2004

About to be at Tate Britain, or Meanwhile in Cork Street: Peter Campbell on Gwen and Augustus John · 7 October 2004

At the National Portrait Gallery: Peter Campbell on fashion photography · 23 September 2004

In the Park · 19 August 2004

At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Russian landscapes · 5 August 2004

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on gardens · 8 July 2004

At Tate Modern: good plain painting and men in shirt-sleeves · 24 June 2004

On the way to Maidenhead · 3 June 2004

At Somerset House: Peter Campbell on Islamic art · 6 May 2004

At the National Portrait Gallery: Peter Campbell on being photographed · 15 April 2004

In Lille: Peter Campbell on Rubens · 1 April 2004

At the Hayward: Roy Lichtenstein · 18 March 2004

At the Royal Academy: Peter Campbell on Vuillard · 19 February 2004

At the Royal Academy: Philip Guston fouls the nest · 5 February 2004

At the British Museum: Living, Dying and Enlightenment · 22 January 2004

At The Whitechapel: Peter Campbell on Gerhard Richter · 8 January 2004

At the Imperial War Museum: Eric Ravilious · 4 December 2003

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At the Atlantis Gallery: Peter Campbell on the Survey of India · 6 November 2003

At the Royal Academy: How to Draw Horses · 9 October 2003

At the British Museum: London 1753 · 25 September 2003

On Video · 11 September 2003

At the V&A: Peter Campbell on Ossie Clark · 21 August 2003

At the British Museum: Medical Curiosities · 7 August 2003

At the Baltic: Peter Campbell on Antony Gormley · 24 July 2003

In the City · 22 May 2003

At the Saatchi Gallery: Peter Campbell on London’s new art gallery · 8 May 2003

At the V&A: Peter Campbell on Art Deco · 17 April 2003

In the Marketplace · 3 April 2003

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At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Titian · 6 March 2003

At Tate Britain: British Art and the French Romantics · 20 February 2003

At the Whitechapel: Peter Campbell on Mies van der Rohe · 23 January 2003

At the British Museum: Peter Campbell on Dürer · 2 January 2003

Reading the Signs · 12 December 2002

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Gainsborough · 28 November 2002

On the Catwalk · 14 November 2002

At Dulwich Picture Gallery: Peter Campbell on David Wilkie · 31 October 2002

At Salford Quays: Daniel Libeskind · 17 October 2002

At Tate Modern: Peter Campbell on Barnett Newman · 3 October 2002

In the Physic Garden: Peter Campbell in Chelsea · 19 September 2002

On the Beach · 5 September 2002

At Tate Britain: Peter Campbell on Thomas Girtin · 22 August 2002

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At Tate Britain: Lucian Freud · 25 July 2002

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At the British Library: Great Nations of Europe Coming Through · 27 June 2002

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In Venice: Tourist Trouble · 6 June 2002

In Brighton · 23 May 2002

At Tate Britain: Hamish Fulton · 9 May 2002

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  • The Rainbow Bridge: Rainbows in Art, Myth and Science by Raymond Lee and Alistair Fraser

At the Barbican: Peter Campbell on Martin Parr · 4 April 2002

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At the Hayward: Paul Klee · 21 March 2002

Why does it take so long to mend an escalator? · 7 March 2002

At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Aelbert Cuyp · 7 March 2002

In New Zealand · 21 February 2002

In Denbigh Road · 7 February 2002

At the National Gallery: Goya · 14 January 2002

At the Imperial War Museum: Agitprop · 3 January 2002

Among the Artefacts: Peter Campbell at the V&A · 13 December 2001

At the National Gallery: Peter Campbell on Pisanello · 29 November 2001

At the Brunei Gallery: Indian photography · 1 November 2001

On the Streets · 18 October 2001

At the Royal Academy: Peter Campbell on Frank Auerbach · 4 October 2001

At the British Library: Peter Campbell takes the lie of the land · 20 September 2001

At the Musée Galliera: Children’s clothes · 6 September 2001

At Tate Britain: Michael Andrews · 9 August 2001

At Condor Cycles · 19 July 2001

At the National Gallery: Vermeer and de Hooch · 5 July 2001

At Tate Britain: James Gillray · 21 June 2001

At the Museum of London: Artists’ studios · 7 June 2001

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At Tate Britain: Stanley Spencer · 19 April 2001

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At the National Gallery: Paintings from the Berlin Nationalgalerie · 22 March 2001

  • Spirit of an Age: Paintings from the Berlin Nationalgalerie

At the Hayward and the British Museum: With Goya and Rembrandt · 8 March 2001

  • Rembrandt the Printmaker by Erik Hinterding and Ger Luijten et al
  • Goya: Drawings from His Private Albums edited by Juliet Wilson-Bareau

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At the Royal Academy: Caravaggio · 8 February 2001

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At the Royal Academy: Turner’s watercolours · 4 January 2001

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Not currently in the LRB archive

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 not available in archive Jug and Bottle · 29 July 1999

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From the LRB letters page